Internet search giant Google has joined forces with OpenDNS and several Content Delivery Networks (CDN) to launch the Global Internet Speedup (GIS) group to help standardise the process of making websites load faster by optimising the Domain Name System (DNS).

Most independent broadband ISPs operate their own Domain Name System (DNS), which at its most basic is responsible for converting Internet Protocol ( IP ) addresses (e.g. "84.2.56.90") into human readable form (e.g. a website domain name like "ISPreview.co.uk"). Sadly ISP DNS servers are often slower and more restrictive than free alternatives, such as those offered by Google and OpenDNS, which makes free services very attractive.

The Global Internet Speedup initiative is designed to build upon recent extensions to the DNS system by agreeing the adoption of a shared standard for intelligent routing of end-user (that's you) web requests.


The internet is full of CDN's and most of these operate almost seamlessly in the background of your connection. Unfortunately knowing which is the best CDN for any given user, at any given time has until now been somewhat difficult to achieve.

Now, with edns-client-subnet, a portion of the users IP address can be included in the DNS response. This is information that was not previously included in the DNS requests and should make it easier to send requests via the fastest rout. We've been using OpenDNS for years on our own connection and have always found it better than our ISPs solution.